The green fields of France
by Murron Bartlett
Summary: Set after series 4


Author's note: I do not own Blackadder or the song "The Green Fields of France. I have been to the World War 1 sites in Belgium and France, and it was a life changing experience. I hope that in some way while writing this I have been able to respectfully talk about those who were lost in the Great War, for ww1, like any war, was a tragic event that should never be forgotten.

The Green Fields of France.

By Tay Bartlett.

Sam wandered alone up the slight hill, the warmth of the sun burning the back of his neck as he finally reached the top. His legs were aching and so was his head. He had been walking all day to reach this place, and he was almost ready to collapse. His head ached savagely, assaulted by the heat of the afternoon. His skin had been burned a deep brown and his blue eyes stood out in stark relief from his sun tanned face. He lifted a hand, wiping a strand of black hair away from his forehead.

After a short pause to gather both his breath and his thoughts, Sam walked on. The sky above him was the deep blue of sapphires and the green grass beneath his feet glittered like a field of emeralds in the summer sun. In the distance, fields of red poppies tossed their heads in the light breeze, somehow looking more like droplets of blood upon the green grass. Around him, the birds added their melodies to the ambience of the day as Sam strolled on. The peace and tranquillity was somewhat ironic, considering where he was at this moment.

All around him were fields full of shell holes and grave stones that poked up through the ground like teeth in an open mouth. These grim looking grey stones were complete with row upon row of faded letters that, if one cared to get closer, would reveal over a thousand names, all of them the names of people who had been lost in the red sea of war. There were names beyond counting. As Sam turned right, he allowed his tired and aching eyes to scan the row upon row of graves, searching for the one name that he had travelled across France to see.

A light breeze blew up from the west and caused the trees to whisper around Sam, standing in the middle of the make shift graveyard. He felt intimidated and unbelievably small surrounded by the rows of gravestones that marked the resting places of the fallen soldiers. An eerie feeling stole over him as he moved further into the graveyard. Certain names, with the ancient writing etched into the stone, seemed to leap out at Sam, each one appearing more clearly in his mind.

At long last, Sam found the name he was looking for.

The single gravestone in question bore four names, each one faded almost into invisibility upon the warn grey stone. In a dazed reverie, Sam stood before it, eyes focused exclusively upon the faded lettering as he committed it to the kind of memory that no photo album could ever capture.

Each name rang a curious and age old bell, as if he was being reunited with friends long forgotten. Kevin Darling. 1889. George, 1896. S Baldrick. 1895. And at the bottom, his great grandfather, Edmund Blackadder, born 1870. Every name upon this single gravestone had the same date of death, 1917, one year before the end of the war that these four men had lain down their lives to fight. They had all died on the same day, had maybe even lived in the same dugout, each one suffering his fellows' hardships, each one struggling on in total futility as the generals at the top made all the decisions.

Sam stared at the name at the bottom, Edmund Blackadder. He had heard many a story about his great grandfather, about how he had been one of those men who could talk their way out of a room with no doors. About how he was one of those people who was entirely committed to serving himself, but always seemed to acquire a strange and dedicated group of friends and followers while doing so. Sam knew not whether these rumours were true, but didn't think they mattered. Nobody alive would ever be able to ask him.

Sam briefly wondered who his great grandfather's fellows had been. They were just names to him yet he knew that the men who lay beneath the dry soil had had lives and cares of their own. Who had Kevin Darling been? What had George's sir name been? What had the S in Mr Baldrick's name stood for?

He could of course answer none of these questions. Yet he couldn't help but think of them as he delved into his ruck sack for his phone. He stood and took a photo of the old gravestone, making sure that he could clearly see all four names written upon it.

Sam stood, phone in hand, surprised that these four men had actually been named, that these four men had had bodies to bury at the end of the war that had killed ten percent of the world's population. Many hadn't. All around him, stood gravestones that sheltered and protected the bodies of unknown soldiers. Upon these gravestones were the words, "a soldier of the Great War, known unto God." Tears welled up in Sam's eyes as he thought of those unknown soldiers. He at least, had a known family member to return to. He at least knew who his great grandfather had been. None of these unknown soldiers had families, for nobody knew who they were. The sadness in his soul upon that realisation was profound and somehow too difficult to put into words.

He turned to go, casting his eye for the final time over the faded letters of Edmund Blackadder's name. He cared not for the rumours that had attached themselves to his great grandfather's memory. He preferred to imagine how the man may have been before he died almost one hundred years ago. Had he been a captain? Had he been in command of his dugout, giving out the orders and ensuring that his fellow soldiers obeyed them? Had he laughed and sang with the rest of the men, joining in with their dreams and spoken musings of home? Sam supposed that he may have done. He must have had someone that he had cared about. A wife, or a girl friend maybe, or even a close friend. Sam could imagine him standing there, resplendent in his soldiers' uniform and probably hating every minute of it, sitting and eating fake food with the rest of his companions and trying to look upon the bright side of what had become his life. Sam could imagine his great grandfather living out each and every day in the trenches that had been scattered under the plow many years back, ending every one of those days with a prayer to the heavens, grateful that he had survived another day of brutal warfare.

Then Sam Blackadder's mind wandered to the darkest of these thoughts. How had his great grandfather felt on the day of the big push? How had he felt as he had stood with his men, preparing to advance and rise out of the trenches to throw all that he could at the enemy? Had he been scared? Sam knew that he hadn't survived. This gravestone proved that, but had Edmund Blackadder been hoping to? Had he hoped to be the one man saved from the hail of bullets that had rained down upon them, or would he have been glad to have escaped from the rest of World War 1? Or would he have been resigned to the inevitable truth, that being his almost certain death? Sam tried to see through his grandfather's eyes, picturing the scene of barbed wire, pot holes and shells scattered everywhere, a constant reminder of death that had been an ever present shadow, lurking beyond the walls of every dugout. His great grandfather had climbed out of those dugouts, his bayonet in hand, hoping to God that he would survive but knowing in some deep corner of his mind that he probably wouldn't. The grim certainty would have been bad enough, knowing that you were about to die with no understanding of who or what you were fighting for, but putting your trust and faith in the generals to know. What had it been like, to know that in a moment, your life would be snatched away from you and that you would be replaced by others who had signed up in the belief that war was somehow a noble and glamourous thing, a notion that had been drilled into their heads from the outset back in 1914.

Did his great grandfather know that his great grandson, Sam Blackadder, a young man from a tiny village in England had journeyed across the sea to France to visit his grave side? Did he know that over a century later, people were still coming to the fields of Belgium and France to pay their respects to those who had fallen? Would Edmund Blackadder be grateful at the recognising, or simply disgusted by the fact that a century had passed and people still hadn't learned the lessons of the past? If he had been in a position to judge, Sam would have. People never learned, even when the evidence stared them right in the face.

Sam walked away across the parched fields, back to where he had come from, certain that though Edmund Blackadder's body lay in no man's land, his memory would be carried around by his great grandson for the rest of his life. Sam would return some day, to the same spot, maybe even with a son of his own. He would stand by that same gravestone, telling his son about the trials and suffering caused by the Great War. He would tell him of his great grandfather in the vein hope that their memory would be kept alive. For if the memories of the soldiers endured, maybe humanity would endure also. Sam knew that war would never become a thing of the past. War would always exist somewhere, but if people remembered what wars were fought for, maybe they would be able to keep humanity alive.

Sam doubted it though.

"The sun shines bright on the green fields of France,

The warm summer breeze makes the red poppies dance,

the trenches are scattered long under the plow,

No gas, no barbed wire, there's no gun firing now.

But here in this graveyard, it is still no man's land,

The countless white crosses are mute where they stand,

To man's blind indifference to his fellow man,

Of a whole generation that were butchered and damned."


End file.
